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Good afternoon. I would like to introduce our dear friend, Martin Kramar, from Slovakia, from the city of Martin. He is a long-time disciple of our beloved Gurudev. Martin studied in the USA for 11 years and then moved to Dubai, where he has lived for 15 years. He is a psychologist who specializes in different breathing techniques, yoga, and stress research. He currently works as a professor at the Canadian University in Dubai. The stage is yours, Martin. Thank you very much, Roman, for the introductions and the warm welcome from all of you. Thank you to Avatar Purī G and all the organizers for inviting me here today. I feel truly at home after such a long time. I will begin with a story that may interest the younger generation. When I was young in the early 90s—specifically 1995—I first met Swamiji and was introduced to yoga. I went to him with self-confidence and said I wanted to go abroad to work and study. I told him I wished to go to Dubai. He asked, "When do you want to go?" I said, "Now." As you might recognize, he did not like this idea. He said, "No, you will go to America." I never wanted to go to America, but I eventually applied to university there. I originally intended to study sports management, but I studied in the US for 11 years and finished my degrees in psychology. After 11 years, I returned to Slovakia for about two years, doing many consultations, including in sports psychology. Then I received an offer to work at the German Neuroscience Center in Dubai Healthcare City. So, my wish to go to Dubai came true after 16 years. I have now been working in Dubai for 15 years. Time flies very quickly. This is a message for the young generation who have ambitions to study and see their future connected with yoga. Today, I have prepared a presentation that will be very interesting for all of you, especially for yoga teachers. I do a lot of research on stress, so the presentation will be about stress and the benefits of yoga exercises: Prāṇāyāma, Kumbhaka Prāṇāyāma, and Kriyās. Now is the time when this Asian or Vedic culture, in terms of yoga exercises, can be very easily proven scientifically in the West. I will use some scientific, medical language, which I think is very useful. As a yoga teacher, you can explain this in different terminology to your clients. Today, I will talk about stress, particularly as seen through heart rate variability measurements. I specialize in this in Dubai—not because I am stress-free, but because I am learning. We are all learners of life. I will explain how stress is seen through the autonomic nervous system. Then we will move to Kaṭuprāṇāms, Kriyās, and Prāṇāyāms, especially their daily practice benefits. Finally, I will mention some connections between yoga and contemporary psychology. We all have stress. It is a response to the external and internal environment. In psychology, we recognize the outside and inside environments. The outside environment—situations, people, decision-making, various energies—is not in our hands. What is in our hands is the inner environment: our way of thinking, breathing, evaluating things, and especially our willpower, concentration, and monitoring the mind. This is something nobody can do for us. We are interconnected, but we are alone in this task. We will discuss stress from different perspectives: doubts, insecurities, attachments. There is also protective stress, or what we might call arousal—the excitement and energy to do things. I do many measurements. Heart rate variability is a simple measurement through heartbeats. I have seen thousands of measurements; you need only five minutes to see a lot from this imprint. In my eyes, this variability is like the DNA imprint of a person. When an Ayurvedic doctor touches your pulse, in a few seconds he knows what kind of doṣas you have—Pitta, Kapha, and Vāta. It is similar with heart rate variability, which covers the autonomic nervous system. We have two branches: the parasympathetic (Iḍā) and the sympathetic (Piṅgalā). We are all looking for the balance of these energies within our body. The most important factor for creating this balance is breathing. When we inhale, the heart rate goes up—the time between pulses shrinks. When we exhale, the heart rate goes down—the time between pulses extends. This exhale phase is very important; we will focus on that. What is variability? Many of you may have watches that control your heart rate. Do you think a heart rate around 60 is good? It could be good for athletes, but we only see the average. We need to see how the heart rate changes when you inhale and exhale. This is most important. All of you, as you do yoga, are stretching your heart rate variability; you are extending your vitality. We look for the highest point of the inhale and the lowest point of the exhale within your capacity. This variability is the goal of certain exercises like Prāṇāyāma and especially Kriyās. We know about the autonomic nervous system. When you are stressed, the heart rate escalates; you may not have saliva, among other things. The parasympathetic, on the contrary, calms your heart rate down—the time between pulses increases. You may have good saliva production, digestion, and more. In medical terms, two systems cover our stress response. The first is the Sympathetic Adrenal Medullary (SAM) system, a quick response releasing epinephrine and norepinephrine. The second is the Hypothalamic-Pituitary-Adrenal (HPA) axis, which releases cortisol. Cortisol is the worst, as it is linked to depression and heavy stress, while epinephrine is more related to arousal or excitement. We also know our brain has two hemispheres. The right hemisphere is more connected to our intuitive side, the parasympathetic nervous system (Iḍā). Left nostril breathing can be very intuitive, heart-oriented, art-oriented, connected to music and talents. Such people have high sensitivity and may suffer a lot in certain situations. The left hemisphere is more logical, analytical, and outcome-oriented toward the external environment. For decision-making, we need both hemispheres active. Decision-making is sometimes the most difficult task; you need your intuitive side and logical tools. I will show you examples of how we see patients through variability. Here is a graph with a straight line. This person was after a heart operation. The average heart rate is 62, which is not bad, but the variability (SDNN) is 12.4. Anything below 30 is bad. If the heart does not recover after the operation and we do not see spikes, this person will not live long. In contrast, good variability looks like this. You need at least a 20-beat difference between inhale and exhale points—a 20-beat stretch of the pulse. This is variability for a parasympathetic-dominant person. The beats are very spiky, with spikes close together. In a five-minute measurement, you can see this immediately, as it also reflects personality. The parasympathetic state has advantages like good stamina and is connected to sensitivity. This person could run a marathon. However, too much comfort can be a disadvantage; such a person may be laid back, procrastinate, indifferent, slow, or introverted, with possible social phobias. High sensitivity can be difficult to switch off, as this person can read other people's minds. In contrast, this is what stress looks like. The variability creates clusters. I call it "popcorn." This person can be explosive, goal-oriented, left-hemispheric, logical, insensitive, stubborn, and very good for business. Next is a case study. This is a five-minute measurement of a 35-year-old lady with high anxiety. She started well, with a heart rate around 60 on average, but suddenly it escalated to 120 and then went down to a parasympathetic state at the end. Many of us experience similar things. This is an example of a panic attack. The increase was about 60 beats. She did not move during the measurement, as heart rate can increase from movement or swallowing. She was thinking. I asked her, "What happened here? What were you thinking?" She hesitated but then said she was thinking about her ex-husband. How can we understand this? This increase, lasting about a minute and a half, floods the system with negative hormones like cortisol. It was good because we identified the core problem: the ex-husband. The issue is that cells do not recognize whether you see stress or the ex-husband with physical eyes or whether you imagine or dream about it. Dreams are the worst; we have little control. But we can manage imagination and waking thoughts. In this case, the ex-husband was 5,000 kilometers away in America. She was just imagining him. The heart rate increased about 60 beats due to anger. The cells within our system recognize this imagined threat and shoot adrenaline to protect us. It is like a snake striking at an imagination, but the poison goes into our own body. She imagined the ex-husband, and the cells, having memories, reacted immediately. It is like a virus for the system. If this pattern is built up over many years, these panic attacks can repeat many times within an hour. It is a self-jeopardizing mechanism she is not aware of and does not know how to handle. So, what does she need to do? Yoga in daily life is the first step. But then, slowly, we want to wipe out this heart rate increase when she thinks about the ex-husband, so the cells do not shoot adrenaline. What she needs to do... Has anyone here experienced divorce? It is not easy. What is the solution? She needs to change her stance toward the ex-husband. This is an example for all of us—it could be an ex-wife, money, or any attachment. There is one word for what she needs to do. All religions have it. Praying can help, but specifically for the ex-husband image in her mind: "Forgive." Thank you very much. So, forgiveness. But how to forgive with so much pain? It means wishing the ex-husband well, making peace with what happened, evaluating the situation differently, seeing the reality that the person did not love you, and moving forward. This is therapy; it will not happen overnight. It may take weeks or months. She needs to make peace so that when the ex-husband appears in her mind again, she can give unconditional love—wishing him all the best. Thank you for this learning. Then, the cells will no longer recognize this image as a threat, and it will slowly fade out. In Western culture, forgiveness is often considered weakness. But if you forgive somebody, you are actually helping yourself. All pain disappears through unconditional love. Palpitations, panic attacks, and many things we are attached to and fear cause us great pain. We need to understand that for these things, we are alone. We feel based on how we evaluate situations. Positive thinking is not about being naive; it is knowing what you want and navigating through obstacles. For someone with weaknesses or fatigue, you can see five different clusters in this five-minute measurement, representing five different topics playing out. This thinking can be connected to the future or the past. Unresolved problems from the past play through our mind like a movie. Often, we cannot change the past, but we need to change our stance toward it. When you suffer over something that happened years ago, the cells have memories and can bring back the same emotional feelings, positive or negative. Only the negatives cause suffering. The only way to fix it is to understand that past situations are just movies playing in our mind. Only you can change it, using the techniques we learn here—yoga, Prāṇāyāma, etc. We have been given this gift and should use it in everyday life. Here we see a beautiful variability. This is our goal: to develop a coherent, steady variability with consistent heartbeat widths. We need to train for this. Only this coherent variability gives us the desired hormones. All training leads us to activate meditations with special breathing that provides positive hormonal exposure. Any sudden increase in heart rate during movement or meditation is connected to different hormonal responses. Check yourself: Can you be steady for five to ten minutes with a breathing pattern suitable for meditation? This is one of the most important things, connected also to unconditional love. When you radiate feelings toward an idol, friend, partner, or colleague—anyone—without any expectation in return, that is unconditional love. Expectations create stress, anxiety, and desire. Heart rate variability is a useful tool to monitor yourself during practices. The most powerful things I have ever measured for energy are the Kriyās. In Kriyās, you extend variability by 50 or more pulses. When you inhale, the heart rate goes up. When you hold the breath after inhale (Antara Kumbhaka), especially with Mūla Bandha, the heart rate continues to increase. When you exhale, the heart rate goes down. When you hold the breath after exhale (Bāhya Kumbhaka), the heart rate goes down further. No other exercise can achieve such variability. This is a measurement of me. The lowest heart rate was 41 and the highest was 95—a 54-beat difference. With regular practice, you can achieve a 45-pulse difference. What does this mean for us? On the right side, you can see the relaxation phase after Kriyās. As you lay down, nothing is as powerful for system rejuvenation. In normal life, I have a threshold. My heart rate is between 60 and 80. If something stressful comes unexpectedly and my heart rate stays under this threshold, I won't feel it. Doing Kriyās is like having a bulletproof vest. You create a vacuum for yourself because the heart rate does not reach the peaks. It is like stretching in yoga: you push to your limit, and everything afterward is enjoyable. The same applies to the nervous system. Modern science does not yet apply these techniques for stretching the nervous system; it is our goal to implement them in therapeutic sessions. Kriyā is very powerful; nothing matches its energy level. Kaṭuprāṇām is a beautiful exercise. I live in Dubai with many Muslims who do similar exercises in prayer—going up, down, putting the head toward the floor. They would never call it yoga, but if they do this five times a day, it is a beautiful reset. They are very dedicated, with patience and fasting, which can be very helpful. How do we see Kaṭuprāṇām through variability? When you do Kaṭuprāṇām, you work on the balance between heart rate and blood pressure. It is good for energy accumulation, and afterward, the heart rate goes down very quickly to baseline, which is especially useful in the morning. Many people go running in the morning. When you run, the heart rate remains elevated for two to three hours afterward. Running uses our energy. The best morning routine might be slow walking to breathe out oxygenated air, followed by Prāṇāyāma and exercises like Kapālabhāti Prāṇāyāma. Running is healthy, but I suggest it in the evening to burn cortisol and adrenaline accumulated during the day. Running is better than nothing, but the worst is waking up and doing nothing—just sitting in the car and driving to work while still in the mood of a dream. That emotion stays with you for half the day if you do nothing. But if we do our exercises—Prāṇāyāma, Kaṭuprāṇām—every morning, we get a dosage of preparation for the day. As soon as you close your door, you begin expending energy through thinking, decision-making, problems, and conversations. The precious time is in the morning. Everyone should make their own sādhanā. Now we have scientific proof that it works. Regarding Prāṇāyāma exercises, there are many beautiful variabilities we can create. It is a little complicated because the svaras (nostril dominance) change every hour and a half, so measurements vary. I cannot say that Iḍā activates only the parasympathetic and Piṅgalā only the sympathetic, as it changes. Therefore, research on Prāṇāyāma is complicated, but you can play with it. Svara Yoga is very useful. We see which nostril is more active; after Prāṇāyāma, both should be active. There are different activations for different svaras. For example, before sleep, you should have the right nostril (Piṅgalā Svara) active. This works 100% for me. I check before watching movies or sleeping. Lie on your right side because Piṅgalā is sun, and outside is moon, creating balance. With patients, I turn according to the active nostril, and it works. I can read it better now. There are many other techniques as you gain more awareness of Prāṇāyāma. Measuring Prāṇāyāma is not easy. I went for a functional MRI to do this research. It is not easy to be in the tube and execute Prāṇāyāma, but I proved it. When doing breathing—three inhales and three exhales—there is activity in the olfactory and cortical regions. When doing Anuloma-Viloma, both hemispheres were activated. We can do much research to advertise and implement these practices in therapeutic systems. There is much we still do not know, but Prāṇāyāma is very active in the frontal lobe, the prefrontal cortex, related to decision-making, judgment, and the third eye. Monitoring thoughts gives us more mental flexibility in recognizing them. There are many other measurements we can use to prove the benefits of beautiful yoga exercises. Time is running out, and I see the gesture that we are coming to an end. Perhaps in the future, I can share another perspective on the benefits of yoga exercises. As I said, Western medical science is now proving what Eastern cultures already knew. The West and East are connecting. That is our mission: to propagate these exercises. As yoga teachers, we inspire others, but nowadays you need science to back you up. I will end now. Thank you very much. You are a great audience. I hope this enriches your knowledge with scientific inputs you can give to your students, increasing your self-confidence to continue yoga exercises and the system of yoga in daily life. Thank you very much.